Dreaming and Nightmares
by sellar door
Summary: Angel has a violent dream of his true love, the Chosen One. Takes places post Not Fade Away.
1. Chapter 1

Songfic type deal that I wrote for a guild of mine called 'What We Do.' Takes placed after the end of both shows, the group now living over the Hellmouth in Cleveland, Ohio. The song is a Boys Night Out Tune, from the Trainwreck album, with the same title. Enjoy.

* * *

_Dreaming._

It was warm out. The windows were pushed opened as the two of them laid in bed together, still wrapped in each others arms despite the heat. The blankets were kicked to the bottom of the bed, clothes had been shed to the bare minimum in an effort to keep cool. Even the fan -- that was blowing mostly on Buffy -- wasn't enough to fight off the muggy climate and high temperatures of the June weather.

But that wasn't where Angel was at the moment. At least, that's not where he was inside of his head. Far off, in the destroyed town of Sunnydale, he was creeping the streets of an equally warm night, in an effort to chase something. Someone. He watched from above as he moved down a street, arms swinging loose at his sides, almost as if he didn't have a care in the world. Something was off, not right. As he passed a trash can, he knocked it over, boot kicking out to send the garbage rolling into the street. There was a muffed sob, a choke cry. A female voice. His prey. Who he was stalking.

_On some nights you'll find me falling,  
I am formless, I am shapeless,_

Up ahead on the sidewalk was the crumpled form of his love, covered in her own blood and raggedly torn clothes. Out for a night of slaying, a night of patrolling the city streets to rid the world of one more evildoer. Of one more vampire. Why wasn't he helping her? He was moving forward slowly, almost as if he was enjoying the sight of her broken body crawling away on her hands and knees. Coming to stand beside her, his tall figure looming over her, the grin on his face didn't belong. It wasn't natural. One word could describe the vampire he was viewing; menacing.

_And on some nights I'm better left alone.  
You take it all in from some severed state of stasis._

Angel watched as another kick flew, this one coming roughly against the Slayer's stomach, knocking her off of all fours and flipping her over so she was on her back. The force of the blow had also sent her into the side of the building they were just in front of, her side slamming harshly into the brick front just below a large glass window.

"Buffy. Buff. Buffster. What's wrong, doll? You look like you're about to cry." Those were words he'd never say to her in a million years. If he had ever stumbled down a street and she was in the shape he was viewing her ass, he'd lift her into his arms, pull her against his chest, and whisper that things were going to be okay softly into her ear.

_You scream 'wake up!' inside your own body, but  
You're buried or suffocating. Or worse._

The blonde let out a grunt as the blow connected, another following as she hit the unforgiving brick beside her, sobs following afterwards. Blood was coming from her mouth now, dripping over her lips as she coughed out a terse "Fuck you," to the vampire. A soft 'tsking' noise came from him as he moved closer, crouching down so he was beside her. Fingers tangled themselves in locks of her hair, pulling her head up roughly. Savagely. In his sleep, Angel let go of the girl, rolling over onto his other side so his back was to her. He was soft murmuring as he the vision continued on.

_Tonight I'm wrapped up in her,  
We find each other under,  
Blankets as warm as summer,  
We are inseparable._

"Is that the proper way for a young lady such as yourself to speak? No, no, I don't think it is. You're going to have to be punished for that." With another harsh tug, he had forced her into a sitting position. His tongue snaked out, running softly against her chin and up to the corner of his lips, cleaning off the blood that was spilling out. In turn, she gathered up all the bloodied saliva she could, ready to spit it in his face. Sensing this, he slammed her back roughly against the store before she had a chance to follow through.

"Spitting now? I'm hurt. I thought we were friends?" Feigning that she had hurt his feeling, he placed a hand over his long-dead heart, pouting a bit. Standing slowly, he pulled her up with him, her back now against the cool window pane behind her. He was much taller than her, and with his fingers wrapped tightly around her neck, he held her up so not even the tips of her toes could touch the cement below.

_Our bodies know what they're for,  
And we give in, we explore,  
Each other desperate for,  
Something inseparable._

His sleep had been plagued with these dreams for the past few days, each one of them playing out the exact same way. Rolling over again to face her, one arm wrapped tightly around her waist. The Slayer moaned for him to be still, mostly out of it, but she shifted her position to push her back against his chest. Back in Sunnydale, his face had changed into that of his demon half.

"I told you that running was only going to make the punishment worse, but you didn't listen, did you? You had to go and try to get away from me. Must be a blonde thing -- too stupid for your own good." Just when she felt like she was going to black out from lack of air, eyes wide with fear, he turned slightly and tossed her body through the air. As if she wasn't beaten enough, the Slayer landed atop of a car windshield, breaking the glass slightly, her lungs frantically trying to fill themselves with air. With eerie speed, his knees were pressed against the metal, hands reaching up to pull her back across the cracked glass she was laying on. From this view, he would be upside-down to her.

_This coma kiss is infinite,  
And I make take your tongue if you stay.  
We are this dream -- fluid and intricate,  
We made it that way.  
Every nightmare needs an influence.  
Your body turning blue as you lay  
Directly next to me one, colors this one  
In bluish hues and darker grays._

"I'd tell you that this is goin' to hurt me more than it is you, but...well. That's a lie. This is going to hurt you a hell of a lot more than it ever will me, blondie." Another evil smirk graced his contorted features as his head lowered. Pulling on her hair again, the vampire forced her head to the side, his lips pressing up against her soft, warm flesh. Angel could see that the fight was beaten from her, her eyes closed, tears rolling down her cheeks as he himself loomed over her broken body. From this angle, the bite was awkward, but thorough enough so that when his pearly white fangs broke the skin, she started sobbing again, begging and pleading for him to stop. Back in the real world, his angelic features had also changed, not realizing that he had taken his vampiric form in his slumber. A soft sigh tore itself from his throat, the unneeded breath of air heavy against the back of Buffy's neck. Like in the dream, he had worked his face closer to her head, almost to the point where he was sitting up.

_Everyday when I awake,  
I'm shaking or worse.  
Tonight it's worse,  
Tonight the screaming hurts._

Pulling away from her slowly, he stood once more towering over the defeated teenager, bringing an arm up to his mouth to use the sleeve of his coat to clean the excess fluid from his mouth. Licking his lips, his face had changed back to his human mask now, arm lowering. There was a dark, crimson stain on his duster now, something that'd remind him of the Slayer.

"Mmm.." The fingers of his right hand reached out, brushing a lock of hair from her face. The silver rings adorning his digits gleamed in the light from the street lamp glowing above, cleaning the blood carefully from her face. She looked beautiful, her breaths becoming fewer and far between now, growing more shallow by the second. Bringing his free hand up, his teeth gently bit into his left wrist, drawing blood from himself. His pale skin pushed against her cracked lips, the liquid coming from him moving over the dried blood that had caked on her lower tier. Almost on instinct, the girl didn't swallow, trying to fight it. "C'mon...drink up, lover." There was nothing she could do to fight it, having to swallow the mouthful she was given if she wanted to continue to breathe. It would only be a matter of time before it took effect, and she would rise from the dead to walk beside him. A creature of the night. A vampire.

_So this is what has become  
Of everything that I loved,  
The betrayal and the blood  
Became inseparable._

His eyes snapped open, his lips were parted and pressed softly against the nape of her neck, elongated teeth trailing along her tanned flesh. Pushing himself back quickly in an attempt to put distance between their bodies, he fell over the side of the bed, taking the sheet with him. It pooled in his lap as he sat on the floor, yellow hued eyes looking around the room quickly. Fortunately enough for him, the girl hadn't stirred a bit at him leaving the bed or all the noise he'd made in his fall. The rest of the night was spent in a chair on the other side of the room, head lowered, forehead resting in his hands, elbows on his knees. When Buffy awoke the next morning, he'd already be gone, having chosen to head back to his place. Angel wouldn't be there to kiss her good-bye before she left for work that morning.

_From the most beautiful nightmare I've ever had;  
Completely inseparable._


	2. Chapter 2

Something that I wrote for a guild of mine called 'What We Do.' Takes placed after the end of both shows, the group now living over the Hellmouth in Cleveland, Ohio. Continuation of the Dreams and Nightmares stories. Most of what Angel/us says are taken out of Boys Night Out songs from the Broken Bones and Bloody Kisses EP. Enjoy.

* * *

His body jerked upright into a sitting position, naked chest covered in a fine sheen of cold sweat. Despite the fact that he hadn't needed to breathe normally in over a two hundred years, his chest rose and fell like any normal person who had just pulled themselves from a nightmare. It had been the same dream for over a week now. Not something that he had just randomly thought of while in a state of unconsciousness, but something that he felt he had just done. Something that was plaguing him. 

----------------

He could still see her face. She was beautiful, a busty brunette that had been on the way home from a long night of bar hopping and drinking herself into a stupor. She hadn't noticed as he tagged along half a block behind her, grinning the whole time while he watched her stumble into a few trash cans by the curb of her apartment building before walking towards the door. That was when he moved.

Fingers of one hand wrapped around her throat, cutting off any sort of scream that might have escaped her in surprise at being assaulted. All that came from her were tiny, choked cries as he dragged her behind him to the park across the street. There, she was tossed over the back of a metal bench, landing hard on her head. As soon as her tanned flesh split and she started spilling blood on the muddy grass below, he could smell it. Not only had she bashed her head open, but one of her arms had been twisted so that when she landed, it snapped.

"The first time I saw a body bend that way I realized it was more beautiful dead than alive. With bloodied flesh removed, your ribcage ripped away, I saw why they say beauty comes from the inside." One boot came down on the back of the bench, stepping up and over it as he landed on the ground beside the girl. She smelled nice. A mix of sweat, blood, and alcohol. Angelus could have just taken her there if he'd wanted to. But it just wasn't his style to feed from a person without first breaking both their body and mind.

Scenes were added and some scenes were missing when his brain played them back to him in his sleep, sometimes watching as Angelus brutally beat the girl to within an inch of her life and sometimes skipping over it with no control over any of it. It all seemed so real. He always remember one moment, however, where he was kneeling over her, holding her head in his lap. The vampire's fingertips traced across her face, now covered in so much blood and gore that she was hardly recognizable. She was perfect looking, one eye swollen shut, struggling to breathe.

"I promise never to forget you. And you'll remember me for as long as you live, because your life ends right here. Right now, as I tear your heart apart. I pray they find you and use the softest words to hide the hardest truth." His thumb pressed against one of the larger gashes on her face, slipping under the skin, his eyes closing and a soft 'coo'ing sound escaping past his pale lips at the screams that followed. "Not even the softest words can heal the deepest wounds."

The blood had started to pool around them, both the male and female covered in it, as well as the large portion of the grass they had been laying in. There was a storm drain nearby, the crimson liquid pouring into the dark recesses like some kind of crimson syrup waterfall. It was beautiful the way it drained away.

"You know, I never got to know you and I never knew your name." The poor, abused creature continue to sob in the monster's arms as his face shifted. With a small growl and a wicked smirk, fangs flashing, she'd be able to see his amber-hued orbs glow in the darkness that surrounded the both of them. "Yeah, life's not fair..." Leaning forward, he placed a small kiss atop her forehead, lips pulling back stained from the bloodied flesh.

"But, you know it has a strange way of working out." A small, menacing chuckled followed his words while his head tipped forward and to the side, mouth opening wide towards her exposed neck. His fangs dragged their sharp tips across the smooth, sensitive flesh of the piece of meat offered up in front of him before the demon stood, leaving her in the morbid blood pool alone. Angel had left her barely hanging onto the edge of life, leaving her in the cold, dark night to die alone.

That was always the point where he woke up, the dream ending and reality once more returning. Just after she begged him to come back to her, wanting him to finish the job so she no longer needed to suffer. But he never had the chance.


End file.
